WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.000 We are coming to you live from the coldest place in the known universe! 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:07.000 Well, near it anyway. 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:11.000 What would you say if I told you that the headquarters for D-Wave, 00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:15.000 the world leader in commercial quantum computing systems, 00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:17.000 is a stone's throw from our warehouse? 00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:23.000 And what would you say if I told you that they invited us in for a behind-the-scenes tour? 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:27.000 Well, Linus, I'd probably say that's exactly what I was expecting, 00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:29.000 given the title and thumbnail of this video. 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:31.000 Stop wasting my time! 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:41.800 Got it! Let's go! 00:00:41.800 --> 00:00:45.800 Cooler Master's 25th anniversary edition, Cosmos II, 00:00:45.800 --> 00:00:50.800 features a unique dual curved tempered glass side panel. 00:00:50.800 --> 00:00:53.800 Check it out now at the link below. 00:00:53.800 --> 00:00:59.150 So, in 2007, D-Wave introduced their first quantum processor. 00:00:59.150 --> 00:01:03.150 Now, with only 16 qubits, it wasn't especially powerful, 00:01:03.150 --> 00:01:07.150 but the point wasn't whether you could or couldn't solve the same problems 00:01:07.150 --> 00:01:08.150 with a 5-inch processor. 00:01:08.150 --> 00:01:10.150 You could use a pencil and a piece of paper. 00:01:10.150 --> 00:01:13.150 The point was that this scalable approach 00:01:13.150 --> 00:01:18.150 would allow them to ship the world's first commercial quantum computer, 00:01:18.150 --> 00:01:23.150 the D-Wave I, in 2011 with 128 qubits, 00:01:23.150 --> 00:01:29.150 followed by 512, 1000, and 2000 qubit designs 00:01:29.150 --> 00:01:34.150 in 2013, 2015, and 2017, respectively. 00:01:34.150 --> 00:01:37.150 And adding more qubits is the key to increasing performance, 00:01:37.150 --> 00:01:39.150 because the more qubits you add, 00:01:39.150 --> 00:01:43.150 the more complex the problems that you can tackle. 00:01:43.150 --> 00:01:47.150 You see, quantum computing doesn't work like classical computing 00:01:47.150 --> 00:01:51.150 with ones and zeros where you feed it a question 00:01:51.150 --> 00:01:53.150 and then it spits out an answer. 00:01:53.150 --> 00:01:59.150 Instead, a quantum processor takes all of the parameters you feed it 00:01:59.150 --> 00:02:01.150 and works on every solution, 00:02:01.150 --> 00:02:06.150 pointing you at one or two or maybe even more optimal solutions. 00:02:06.150 --> 00:02:09.150 So they're not perfect for everything. 00:02:09.150 --> 00:02:12.150 I don't think there's a single person in this building 00:02:12.150 --> 00:02:15.150 who expects Call of Duty Black Ops 10 00:02:15.150 --> 00:02:20.150 to run on a D-Wave Mach 5 quantum gaming rig or anything like that. 00:02:20.150 --> 00:02:25.150 But for scheduling out a sports team's games over the course of a season, 00:02:25.150 --> 00:02:30.150 for tackling problems like logistics, climate change, and energy distribution, 00:02:30.150 --> 00:02:33.150 or for conducting AI research, 00:02:33.150 --> 00:02:35.150 these puppies right here 00:02:35.150 --> 00:02:41.150 have the potential to completely disrupt the existing players. 00:02:41.150 --> 00:02:43.150 So then let's go have a look at one, shall we? 00:02:43.150 --> 00:02:47.150 Now, there are only a handful of customers in the world 00:02:47.150 --> 00:02:52.150 who have actually ponied up the price of a D-Wave system, 00:02:52.150 --> 00:02:55.150 including high rollers like Lockheed Martin, 00:02:55.150 --> 00:02:59.150 Los Alamos National Lab, Google, and NASA. 00:02:59.150 --> 00:03:02.150 But D-Wave themselves have a handful 00:03:02.150 --> 00:03:05.150 of their latest generation 2000 Q7 00:03:05.150 --> 00:03:08.150 systems running here at their headquarters 00:03:08.150 --> 00:03:11.150 that are available through the cloud. 00:03:11.150 --> 00:03:13.150 Just make sure that you don't turn off any of the ones 00:03:13.150 --> 00:03:18.150 with a delightfully low-tech online sign zip-tied to it. 00:03:18.150 --> 00:03:21.150 It might be doing very, very important research. 00:03:21.150 --> 00:03:24.150 So from the outside, a 2000 Q doesn't look that different 00:03:24.150 --> 00:03:28.150 from any other compute cluster with a few black racks. 00:03:28.150 --> 00:03:31.150 And when you open up door number one, 00:03:31.150 --> 00:03:33.150 there's not much at first glance 00:03:33.150 --> 00:03:35.150 to indicate that there's anything special 00:03:35.150 --> 00:03:36.150 about it. 00:03:36.150 --> 00:03:42.150 You'll find a network switch, a UPS for battery backup, 00:03:42.150 --> 00:03:45.150 a normal server responsible for monitoring, 00:03:45.150 --> 00:03:48.150 some monitoring devices that... 00:03:48.150 --> 00:03:50.150 Wait a minute. 00:03:50.150 --> 00:03:55.150 Seven, eight degrees milli-Kelvin? 00:03:55.150 --> 00:03:57.150 We're gonna have to get back to that later. 00:03:57.150 --> 00:04:01.150 There's also a second server that takes a problem 00:04:01.150 --> 00:04:03.150 and translates it into machine code 00:04:03.150 --> 00:04:05.150 using custom room-temperature electricity 00:04:05.150 --> 00:04:08.150 electronics to generate high-precision analog signals 00:04:08.150 --> 00:04:11.150 that it then sends to, as we promised, 00:04:11.150 --> 00:04:15.150 just about the coldest place in the known universe, 00:04:15.150 --> 00:04:18.150 the single, yes, just one chip, 00:04:18.150 --> 00:04:22.150 single codename Washington quantum processor 00:04:22.150 --> 00:04:25.150 at the heart of this machine. 00:04:25.150 --> 00:04:27.150 But where exactly is it? 00:04:27.150 --> 00:04:32.980 It's not behind door two or door number three. 00:04:32.980 --> 00:04:34.980 Back there, you'll find the first 00:04:34.980 --> 00:04:36.980 and second stage pumps that are used 00:04:36.980 --> 00:04:39.980 to create a vacuum around the processor 00:04:39.980 --> 00:04:41.980 to thermally insulate it 00:04:41.980 --> 00:04:44.980 and its cooling system from the outside world, 00:04:44.980 --> 00:04:46.980 as well as a compressor 00:04:46.980 --> 00:04:48.980 for the aforementioned cooling system. 00:04:48.980 --> 00:04:53.980 And you also won't find it in this barrel-shaped doodad. 00:04:53.980 --> 00:04:56.980 That is actually a liquid nitrogen filter 00:04:56.980 --> 00:04:59.980 that removes impurities from the coolant mixture 00:04:59.980 --> 00:05:02.980 of helium-3 and helium-4 isotopes 00:05:02.980 --> 00:05:03.980 and is one of the things 00:05:03.980 --> 00:05:06.980 that allows D-Wave systems to run 00:05:06.980 --> 00:05:08.980 for years at a time, 00:05:08.980 --> 00:05:11.980 a critical feature given that the chip 00:05:11.980 --> 00:05:14.980 kind of locks into a certain configuration 00:05:14.980 --> 00:05:16.980 once it's super cooled. 00:05:16.980 --> 00:05:18.980 And if you heat one of these puppies up 00:05:18.980 --> 00:05:19.980 back to room temperature, 00:05:19.980 --> 00:05:21.980 it can take up to two days 00:05:21.980 --> 00:05:22.980 to cool it back down 00:05:22.980 --> 00:05:24.980 and up to four weeks 00:05:24.980 --> 00:05:26.980 to finish the rebalancing 00:05:26.980 --> 00:05:29.980 or recalibration process. 00:05:29.980 --> 00:05:31.980 No, no, to find the actual processor, 00:05:31.980 --> 00:05:33.980 we have to go past 00:05:33.980 --> 00:05:35.980 this first door on the left here 00:05:35.980 --> 00:05:37.980 that handles connecting the 00:05:37.980 --> 00:05:40.980 all-business racks at the front 00:05:40.980 --> 00:05:44.270 to the giant box here 00:05:44.270 --> 00:05:46.270 that was hiding in plain sight 00:05:46.270 --> 00:05:48.270 that I'll be referring to as the 00:05:48.270 --> 00:05:50.270 party in the back 00:05:50.270 --> 00:05:54.590 or, per D-Wave's gentle suggestion, 00:05:54.590 --> 00:05:57.590 the shielded enclosure. 00:05:57.590 --> 00:05:59.590 This right here is effectively 00:05:59.590 --> 00:06:01.590 a big Faraday cage 00:06:01.590 --> 00:06:04.590 and the first of 16 layers 00:06:04.590 --> 00:06:06.590 of shielding that are designed 00:06:06.590 --> 00:06:08.590 to shield the power lines 00:06:08.590 --> 00:06:10.590 and preserve the integrity 00:06:10.590 --> 00:06:13.590 of the signals to and from 00:06:13.590 --> 00:06:15.590 the quantum processor 00:06:15.590 --> 00:06:18.590 to the greatest degree possible. 00:06:18.590 --> 00:06:20.620 And that was a very intentional pun, 00:06:20.620 --> 00:06:21.620 by the way. 00:06:21.620 --> 00:06:24.620 Now, normally, these rooms are closed 00:06:24.620 --> 00:06:27.620 and there is a series of casings 00:06:27.620 --> 00:06:30.620 on top of this apparatus here 00:06:30.620 --> 00:06:32.620 to maintain the vacuum around 00:06:32.620 --> 00:06:33.620 what is effectively 00:06:33.620 --> 00:06:36.620 the motherboard of our quantum computer. 00:06:36.620 --> 00:06:39.620 But they had one open for maintenance today, 00:06:39.620 --> 00:06:42.620 so we got to get up close and personal. 00:06:42.620 --> 00:06:44.620 The thing is peppered 00:06:44.620 --> 00:06:46.620 with probes and sensors, 00:06:46.620 --> 00:06:49.620 heat exchangers, data wires, 00:06:49.620 --> 00:06:52.620 but the five big plates 00:06:52.620 --> 00:06:55.620 are really the main attraction here. 00:06:55.620 --> 00:06:57.620 Each of them represents a different stage 00:06:57.620 --> 00:06:59.620 of the cooling system. 00:06:59.620 --> 00:07:01.620 The top one gets signals 00:07:01.620 --> 00:07:02.620 from the outside world 00:07:02.620 --> 00:07:04.620 on copper wires 00:07:04.620 --> 00:07:07.620 and runs at a frosty 70 degrees Kelvin. 00:07:07.620 --> 00:07:10.620 The next one down uses the same fridge 00:07:10.620 --> 00:07:12.620 and these braided copper conductors 00:07:12.620 --> 00:07:15.620 to get down to four degrees Kelvin, 00:07:15.620 --> 00:07:17.620 which is both low enough 00:07:17.620 --> 00:07:19.620 to condense helium to a liquid 00:07:19.620 --> 00:07:23.620 and to switch over from copper wires 00:07:23.620 --> 00:07:26.620 to the superconductor niobium. 00:07:26.620 --> 00:07:29.620 The middle plate here uses vacuumed helium-4 00:07:29.620 --> 00:07:31.620 to drop our signal wires 00:07:31.620 --> 00:07:33.620 to one degree Kelvin. 00:07:33.620 --> 00:07:35.620 The fourth uses helium-3 00:07:35.620 --> 00:07:38.620 to get us to about a tenth of that. 00:07:38.620 --> 00:07:41.620 And the final stage uses a sophisticated mixture 00:07:41.620 --> 00:07:43.620 of those two isotopes 00:07:43.620 --> 00:07:46.620 to drive this entire filtering 00:07:46.620 --> 00:07:48.620 and shielding apparatus 00:07:48.620 --> 00:07:51.620 as well as the processor inside 00:07:51.620 --> 00:07:53.620 down to its typical operating temperature 00:07:53.620 --> 00:07:57.620 of about 0.015 degrees Kelvin, 00:07:57.620 --> 00:08:00.620 damn near absolute zero. 00:08:00.620 --> 00:08:03.620 But why does it need to be so cold? 00:08:03.620 --> 00:08:06.620 Niobium already superconducts at nine degrees Kelvin. 00:08:06.620 --> 00:08:10.620 Interstellar space is 3.1 degrees Kelvin. 00:08:10.620 --> 00:08:12.620 Our solar system is even warmer. 00:08:12.620 --> 00:08:16.620 We're talking 0.015 degrees Kelvin. 00:08:16.620 --> 00:08:21.820 Well, this superconducting chip here 00:08:21.820 --> 00:08:23.820 is what's inside there, 00:08:23.820 --> 00:08:27.820 and it's connected via 400 superconducting wires. 00:08:27.820 --> 00:08:29.820 And this is kind of like the pins 00:08:29.820 --> 00:08:31.820 on a CPU socket. 00:08:31.820 --> 00:08:32.820 And what it's doing 00:08:32.820 --> 00:08:35.820 is it's using quantum mechanical effects 00:08:35.820 --> 00:08:38.820 to process information. 00:08:38.820 --> 00:08:41.820 So for that to work, 00:08:41.820 --> 00:08:45.820 these effects need to be significant enough 00:08:45.820 --> 00:08:47.820 to use them for computation, 00:08:47.820 --> 00:08:49.820 which means that the temperature 00:08:49.820 --> 00:08:52.820 needs to be well below 00:08:52.820 --> 00:08:55.820 the energy scale of those quantum effects. 00:08:55.820 --> 00:08:56.820 If it wasn't, 00:08:56.820 --> 00:08:58.820 then the data you'd get 00:08:58.820 --> 00:09:00.820 would be very, very noisy, 00:09:00.820 --> 00:09:04.820 corrupted by heat-related quantum effects. 00:09:04.820 --> 00:09:07.820 That's why the colder they can get, 00:09:07.820 --> 00:09:09.820 pretty much the better. 00:09:09.820 --> 00:09:11.820 And getting even colder in the future 00:09:11.820 --> 00:09:14.820 may actually be practical. 00:09:14.820 --> 00:09:18.820 So this generation of D-Waves processors 00:09:18.820 --> 00:09:20.820 consumes no power 00:09:20.820 --> 00:09:23.820 and outputs no heat, 00:09:23.820 --> 00:09:27.820 meaning that the 20 kilowatts of power 00:09:27.820 --> 00:09:29.820 that are required to run the system 00:09:29.820 --> 00:09:33.820 is just dedicated to the cooling system. 00:09:33.820 --> 00:09:36.820 So unless they wanted to go colder, 00:09:36.820 --> 00:09:39.820 this energy cost doesn't change 00:09:39.820 --> 00:09:41.820 whether you're running 100 qubits 00:09:41.820 --> 00:09:43.820 or 2,000 qubits. 00:09:43.820 --> 00:09:45.820 That's just the sweet spot 00:09:45.820 --> 00:09:49.820 of practicality and functionality today. 00:09:49.820 --> 00:09:51.820 And more cooling is far from the only thing 00:09:51.820 --> 00:09:52.820 on the horizon. 00:09:52.820 --> 00:09:54.820 The future's looking bright 00:09:54.820 --> 00:09:56.820 for our neighbors here at D-Wave. 00:09:56.820 --> 00:09:59.820 They don't have a 50-year vision yet necessarily, 00:09:59.820 --> 00:10:01.820 but in the nearer term, 00:10:01.820 --> 00:10:04.820 they don't really perceive anyone else in the space 00:10:04.820 --> 00:10:06.820 as a real competitor 00:10:06.820 --> 00:10:08.820 with a commercializable technology. 00:10:08.820 --> 00:10:10.820 And with more R&D focus, 00:10:10.820 --> 00:10:13.820 they think their system could be as compact 00:10:13.820 --> 00:10:15.820 as three or four racks 00:10:15.820 --> 00:10:17.820 and capable of taking on 00:10:17.820 --> 00:10:20.820 some of the hardest neural network problems 00:10:20.820 --> 00:10:23.820 that we face in the years to come. 00:10:23.820 --> 00:10:24.820 And you know what? 00:10:24.820 --> 00:10:26.820 Sounds pretty good to me. 00:10:26.820 --> 00:10:29.300 Dollar Shave Club is kind of amazing. 00:10:29.300 --> 00:10:31.300 You can get their high-quality blades 00:10:31.300 --> 00:10:33.300 and their amazing shave butter, 00:10:33.300 --> 00:10:34.300 which 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00:11:36.550 --> 00:11:37.550 If you disliked this video, 00:11:37.550 --> 00:11:38.550 you know where that button is. 00:11:38.550 --> 00:11:39.550 But if you liked it, 00:11:39.550 --> 00:11:40.550 hit the like button, 00:11:40.550 --> 00:11:41.550 get subscribed, 00:11:41.550 --> 00:11:42.550 and maybe check out 00:11:42.550 --> 00:11:44.550 where to buy the stuff we featured 00:11:44.550 --> 00:11:45.550 at the link in the video description. 00:11:45.550 --> 00:11:48.550 Okay, less applicable for this video than usual, 00:11:48.550 --> 00:11:50.550 but we also have links down there 00:11:50.550 --> 00:11:51.550 to our merch store, 00:11:51.550 --> 00:11:52.550 which has cool shirts like this one, 00:11:52.550 --> 00:11:53.550 and our community forum, 00:11:53.550 --> 00:11:56.550 which you should totally join.